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Thursday, January 23, 2014

A Long Story about the K300 (no illustrations yet...)

The K300 Banquet on Monday
evening, about 24 hours after most mushers completed the race, revealed a few
very common themes. First, the trail conditions
were the 2nd worst ever witnessed by K300 racers, being ousted only
by the 2008 race now nicknamed the ‘KuskoSwim’.
Even the 2014 champion, Rohn Buser, highlighted that this might have
been worse than 2008 considering that the outbound portion was where the ‘swimming’
was forcing mushers and dogs to continue for 200 miles further while being soaked
and having ice blocks for boots.
Secondly, most mushers seemed capable of admitting to swearing to
themselves that they would never come to race this course again and it certainly
was not really super fun. However, on
the next breath those same mushers admitted that in hind sight it wasn’t all
that bad and that they would likely be here next year. The ability of people to have this type of selective
amnesia amazes me. The challenge that
the trail conditions posed made this race- simply put-crazy hard and slightly
scary for a newbie like myself.

I left Bethel with bib #2 which
allowed me to run first on the trail for at least three hours. It was spectacular feeling so alone while
watching the K300 fireworks go off over Bethel as we departed. It was clear immediately that the trail was
not going to be easy. The race committee
chose to go on an overland route due to dangerous river ice conditions. Only two days ago this trail had snow cover
which promised a smooth ride. However,
the two days of 40F weather and rain washed away the snow and left bare tundra,
glare ice, and water. The first leg to
Tuluksak is fast as the dogs are excited and full of energy. In going overland, the teams must still cross
ponds and standing bodies of frozen water. The most dangerous ice is that which is smooth
with a fresh shine of water on the top.
The dogs have no traction-and neither does the sled. Crossing these lakes becomes a circus as the
dogs try desperately to cling onto the ice with some ending up sprawled out
knocking over other dogs. Meanwhile the
sled slides back and forth perpendicular to the team so that any bump in the
ice can easily tip over the sled. After
doing this a couple times you begin to wonder how much more of this can the
dogs take-yet the ice skating rinks continued for dozens of miles.

My favorite incident was when my
big wheel dog Deuce slipped on the ice and he froze up sliding backward. At the same time the sled became unstable and
tipped over, along with myself, over and in front of Deuce. So we are sliding along the ice, Deuce, my
sled, and me. The hook ripped into my
pants with my left leg under the sled and I began to worry about how to get out
of this jam! Being dragged by the sled
often seems to last a very long time but it all elapsed in probably 10
seconds. I eventually was able to free
my leg, right the sled, and get poor Deuce back on his feet to attack the next
ice rink 100 yards ahead. On and
on.

At Tuiuksak we cut down to the
Kuskokwim River and head north to Lower Kalskag which is approximately 50
miles. The night was warm just above
freezing. The rain that previously fell
combined with abnormally high temperatures created standing pools of water on
the ice along with slush. The trail was
mostly visible with the water being knee high at times. At one point, snow mixed with rain fell
making it difficult to see where the next trail markers were. Some mushers went along an ice road for part
of this portion while others stayed on the dog trail. Upon arrival in Kalskag teams were piled up
and parking was quite interesting because the lot was glare ice, it was dark,
raining, and no one could really walk let alone guide the leaders to a good
spot. I arrived right behind two other
mushers and the poor checkers where doing their best to help everyone. I felt quite sorry because I was snapping at
them. Joar’s team was stopped directly
in front of mine but perpendicular to my team.
I expected at any moment that the dogs would take off and get super
tangled with his! So I kept yelling to
the checkers to please grab the leaders and tell me where to park. They really weren’t able to help much so my
team went in a couple circles at one point almost going across Jeff King’s
parked team! We finally just grabbed a
spot where the dogs happily rested on piles of straw that I spread out for them
after taking off their icicle booties which protect their feet from cuts. They ate well and I proceeded to get myself
sorted out. Rohn Buser, jokingly (or
maybe not joking) asked if maybe we should take a vote on this becoming the
Kuskokwim 200. At this point, I was
actually scared of the trail ahead. I
had really no idea how in the world we were going to make it up to Aniak. Furthermore, how were we supposed to get the
dogs home?? I had planned for a 4 hour
rest here so I grabbed my sleeping bag to go inside to catch 1 hour of
sleep. I remember thinking that is was now
about 4 am Saturday morning and was considering if it was too early to call my
Mom in Minnesota. Instead of waking her
up, I texted a request for a weather update.
She stated that Aniak was still going to be warm and raining. Super! I had to drop Ripple, one of the 2 main
gee/haw leaders that I was running. She
stopped pulling on the way to Kalskag and her left hind wrist was causing her
pain when I examined her. She is a critical
dog for Iditarod and we couldn’t afford to risk her minor injury turning into a
massive problem for her.

Before crawling into the sleeping
bag, I took off my boots which had about 1” of water. I made the mistake of not putting garbage bags
in my boots to help protect them from water.
While my feet were warm-it could be a scary situation if the temperature
dropped. I did what I could to dry them
out and found a new pair of socks.

Upon waking, I was still full of
dread for the upcoming trail. I sat
their momentarily and watched the other mushers getting prepared and realized
that indeed the race must go on.
Secretly, I might have been hoping that the race would be stalled
pending further conditions but I quickly realized that this race is the real
deal and not for pansy mushers. I bucked
up, got dressed for more water, went out to feed the dogs, put their booties
on, and headed up towards Aniak.

The route around Whitefish Lake
was the reverse of what it usually is so that more mushers might take advantage
of Aniak as a rest stop. Typically,
Aniak is only 30 miles from Kalskag so there is no need to stop there and
rest. Now, the run to Aniak was 50 miles
and so stopping there was logical and ideal.
Aniak is a beautiful and welcoming community surrounded by trees. The trail starts on the river, then crosses
many miles of tundra and frozen lakes.
Once again the tundra was bare and the snow slushy. That being said, it was a gorgeous day. It was dark leaving Kalskag and we were able
to watch the sunrise over the mountains.
It is in moments like that I realize just how lucky I am to be
there. I thought about John and wondered
if he was seeing the same thing as I was. \

I began having trouble again with
Deuce. He is a very large dog (100 lbs)
with black hair. As a 2 year old, he
lacks experience, and was very stressed out from the crazy conditions of the
previous run. He stopped pulling and
soon decided he couldn’t run anymore. So
with 30 more miles to go, the other dogs had to carry Deuce through the bare
tundra and slushy snow/water. The
problem with this is that the heavier the sled, the greater the drag, and the other
dogs became tired quickly in the heat to which they are not accustomed to. In addition, having Deuce in the sled near
the top created a sled that could not steer and it kept falling into the snow
banks. I realized that I needed to
repack the sled so that Deuce’s weight was as low as possible on the sled. This change made it marginally better but
still really slowed us down. The trail
improved greatly as we got closer to Aniak.
The trail reminded me of the ones leading into Ambler with the beautiful
rolling hills and trees. We lost a
couple hours of time on this run and I realized that the team was not going to
be capable of finishing in the time that I had expected. I was looking forward to the two hours in
Aniak and hoped that the rest would energize the dogs. I had the vet thoroughly examine Deuce to make
sure he wasn’t sick. However, as soon as
Deuce got out of the sled, he was happy, refreshing, and eating well. Figures!
Deuce will be a great dog but just needs a bit more confidence and
experience. (Me too maybe!)

With a two hour break, there
really is not much time to sleep. So I
focused on snacking the dogs. I put a
soothing foot ointment on their paws to help reduce any swelling and to cool
them off. After getting booties put
on-we took off back towards Kalskag for 30 miles. I was feeling slightly encouraged by this run
because it appeared that the dogs had a bit of their ‘snap back’. The river had frozen over to some degree and
the trail was slightly better than we expected.
My plan was to pass through Kalskag and continue on until Tuluksak where
there is a 4 hour mandatory rest. I was really second guessing my plan. I knew the dogs were exhausted, they were stressed
out, and could perhaps benefit from the rest.
However, I also knew that if we stopped go rest 3-4 hours we would drop
a considerable number of places. The
dogs could certainly run the 50 miles-physically we run long run all the time
at home. However, mentally they are
young, inexperienced and wondering what they got themselves into! So was I!

After much deliberation, I
stopped long enough to refresh their booties, snack them and go. I decided that resting them for a short while
would create further soreness. I had the
confidence that they could do very well in the next segment but I don’t think
they did. I made a kissing sound for the
leaders, Swift and Ears, to go and they instantly got up and left the
checkpoint with little hesitation. After
about a mile-they decided to change their mind.
They simply moved off the trail and sat down. I was flabbergasted-never having had a team
just decide to quit! I sat there on the
trail and continued to second guess my decision. I decided that I better just take them back
to Kalskag and rest them for that 4-5 hours and see where things were at
then. We turned around and went back
through all the deep pools of water to about 100 yards from the checkpoint
turnoff. Interestingly enough-upon
turning around they could all suddenly pull and suddenly put the pace up to
over 9 mph. Outbound from Kalskag they were barely moving at 7 mph. So, I became stubborn! I stopped the team and thought about all the
long training runs we had and how great of a team they are. I switched out one of the leaders with a
fresh dog and I made them turn back around and head in the right direction. We
don’t give up! It took some time but we
got going in the right direction. Once I
stopped second guessing myself and portrayed that confidence to the dogs-they sensed
it and just accepted the situation.
Their pace became steady at about 8.5 mph and we made our way to
Tulusak. It wasn’t fast but we were
moving. More importantly, we were a team
that didn’t quit.

John arrived in Tuluksak a couple
hours ahead of me and I was very glad to see him there. His dogs were looking great and had wonderful
spunk. They are a young and inexperienced
team which caused him quite a bit of frustration, as well, but the promise of a
record breaking team is evident.

I slept for two hours in Tuluksak
at the school. The teachers there even
made a gluten free macaroni pasta that I could eat! I put my socks and liners in the dryer hoping
to dry out my feet a bit. Regardless, there
was now only 50 miles left until we would make it to Bethel. There were many dogs that I considered
dropping. Most of them were having a
hard time and not pulling as they usually do.
We brought these dogs to the Kusko to give them experience and to
understand how they would do in the Iditarod team. Dropping them, in my mind, meant giving up on
them and their Iditarod potential. So I
kept them all which turned out to be a pretty large error.

The trail to Bethel was
dramatically improved. Cooler temperature
froze the previously standing water and the trail was solid. The tundra was still bare and now had glare
ice to content with. I crashed numerous
times on this route. The funniest time was
when we were traversing this 45 degree angle ice bank and because the wheel
dogs weren’t pulling the sled just slides down the bank. Usually, I can counterbalance this without an
issue, but the sled caught on something and we did a double summersault. Two dogs became overly tired and I put them
in the sled. Joy, being a small dog
around 40 lbs, was not a big deal.
Adding Spook, close to 90 pounds, was a big deal! I definitely wondered if we would finish or
end up camping out 5 miles to Bethel. At
long last Bethel came into view and the finish was in sight. I breathed
a sigh of relief and felt huge pride for the dogs who saw this race through to
the finish.

A race like this teaches new
mushers, like myself, many things. I
realized I have so much to learn about dealing with changing trail conditions,
knowing the difference between a tired dog and a dog ready to quit, and how my
level of confidence passes on the dogs for better or for worse. Now onto Iditarod!

3 comments:

What a great account of your race. I was watching you and wondering what you were going through. I had no idea the conditions were so awful. And I can't believe you have a 90 lb and 100 lb dog on your team!

My daughter's class is learning about the Iditarod race and they all had to pick a musher. My daughter Kayla picked you! We have enjoyed learning about your career and back story and look forward to your blog after you finish the Iditarod! If there is anyway you could write her class an email I know they would all be super excited to hear from a real musher! We are cheering you on in Michigan!!! Krystal and Kayla! Email: KrystelleRN@live.com

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While endurance racing require a tremendous amount of hard work, sacrifice, and dedication-it also requires funding! In the upcoming season, Katherine will be racing in the 2013 Ironman Cozumel, the Kusko 300 Dog Race, Iditarod 2014, Kobuk 440, and 2014 Ironman Couer D'Alene. The phoenix symbolizes rebirth and resurrection. Katherine strives everyday to demonstrate how anyone can 'rise from the ashes of our life' and remake ourself as we choose. Become a part of Phoenix Racing! There are many wonderful causes to contribute to-Katherine can only promise to work hard and spread encouragement and inspiration where ever she goes.